'Pagan Witch' Casts Her Spell In Support of Protests at FTAA Talks
By Robert Nolin
South Florida Sun-Sentinel
Nov.14, 2003

OAKLAND PARK -- A spark of anti-corporate activism was lit Thursday night. By a witch. In the back yard of a church.

Starhawk, a pagan witch and author from Mendocino, Calif., conjured up some spiritualist theory to convince about 80 listeners they should join thousands of others in protest against the Free Trade Area of the Americas meeting next week in Miami.

"Come down to Miami and join the march," she said. "All the people who are affected by this trade agreement need to rise up and link their strength together."

Clad in a billowing blue shirt, wild gray hair framing her face, Starhawk exhorted her audience by the light of a bonfire behind the Unitarian Universalist Church on Northwest 21st Avenue.

Her spellbound fans surrounded her in a circle lit by tiki torches. There were infants and retirees, sandaled paganists in robes of blue or black, women with tattoos and flowing skirts.

They punctuated her words with applause or hoots, or clanging tambourines, bells or drums.

Starhawk, who declined to reveal her given name, railed against the FTAA, which is meeting in downtown Miami next Wednesday through Friday. The summit involves ministers from 34 nations, excluding Cuba, who seek to create a hemisphere-wide free trade area. Some 20,000 protesters, ranging from union workers, environmentalists, and advocates for the poor, are expected to march through Miami in opposition to the proposed trade agreement. Police are also prepared for smaller groups of black-clad anarchists to cause disruptions and property destruction.

They argue the trade policy would cost jobs in the United States, and allow multi-national corporations unbridled freedom to exploit the people and environment of poorer nations.

"It's actually, you could say, a form of insanity," Starhawk declared.
Rather than politics, the author of such books as The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess relied upon a spiritualistic argument of the earth as sacred organism to stir sentiments against the FTAA. "In the FTAA's world ..... the world is a place that should be open to exploitation," she said, as orange sparks from the bonfire scattered skyward. "That's really a pretty pathetic goal for a culture or society."

Starhawk then urged her audience to stand against the FTAA in nonviolent resistance. "It's going to be beautiful," she said. "What we see happening in Miami are all kinds of groups uniting in their strengths."

Robert Nolin can be reached at rnolin@sun-sentinel.com or 954-572-2024